Bronx Neighborhood Fights for Its Spot on the Map

Residents began a campaign to have the Allerton section of the Bronx properly named on maps with the help of Jeremy Warneke, district manager of Community Board 11.

Todd Heisler / The New York Times

By WINNIE HU

April 6, 2014

Allerton residents know where they live. It is everyone else they have to worry about.

For years, this perpetually overlooked neighborhood in the north Bronx has been mislabeled on city and online maps — when it is not left out entirely — and called the wrong name by outsiders who are confused, misinformed or just lost.

Now residents and local officials have set out to get Allerton its cartographic due.

“It’s time to clarify things,” said Joe Thompson, an Allerton resident of five decades. “It would be nice to give our community a little more recognition, a little more juice and a little more respect.”

The neighborhood revolves around Allerton Avenue, a busy thoroughfare that runs past sprawling apartment complexes, tidy family homes and a thriving commercial district. Restaurants, delis, stores and a public library carry the Allerton name. But the Department of City Planning’s community map has long referred to the neighborhood as two others, “Laconia” and “Bronxdale.” Adding to the confusion, Google Maps has called the Allerton neighborhood by yet another name, “Bronxwood,” which is a street that intersects Allerton Avenue. (The Hagstrom Map Company does recognize Allerton.)

The campaign Allerton is waging underscores the pride many city dwellers take in their neighborhoods, even as boundaries shift, names fall out of favor and newcomers — many of them recent immigrants — remake blocks and cultures. The neighborhood’s effort also illustrates the challenge of maintaining accurate records at a time when the Internet and social media can spread and perpetuate errors.

Allerton is named after Daniel Allerton, a 19th-century settler. Today about 60,000 people live in the Allerton area, of whom nearly three-quarters are Hispanic or black, according to an analysis of census data by Queens College. About 36 percent of residents are foreign-born, and 22 percent have a college degree or higher.

Allerton’s median household income is $42,095, compared with $34,300 in the Bronx over all and $51,865 in New York City. “It’s mixed,” said Jose Rosado, 59, a hotel bellman. “You’ve got people from all walks of life.”

Mr. Thompson, 75, said that he first realized that Allerton had been slighted in the late 1990s when he was starting a neighborhood watch group. He pulled out a city map and found to his surprise that he was — according to the map — in Bronxdale. “It just made no sense,” he said. “If you’re going to call it Bronxdale, nobody knows where that is.”

Lloyd Ultan, the Bronx borough historian, said that Bronxdale was a 19th-century village on the eastern bank of the Bronx River, south of Allerton, while Laconia is the name of a former estate through which Laconia Avenue now runs.

Mr. Ultan said he saw the naming of neighborhoods in the Bronx as an exercise in futility because boundaries were often subjective and residents themselves unclear about what neighborhood they lived in. “Nobody knows precisely where a neighborhood ends and begins, because practically overnight the Bronx urbanized and farms were covered with apartment houses,” he said.

The Allerton neighborhood revolves around a busy thoroughfare that runs past sprawling apartment complexes and a thriving commercial district. Fares Albrashi, 35, is a manager for a cellphone store on Allerton Avenue.

Todd Heisler / The New York Times

Michael Shilstone, a spokesman for the planning department, said there was “no legal process for determining neighborhood names.” But he added that it was unusual for the department to receive complaints like Allerton’s because its maps and data “are rooted in historical reference and they evolve as we work closely with communities and local elected officials to ensure they are updated and reflect common parlance.”

In recent months, Bronx Community Board 11, which represents Allerton, and local elected officials have called on city planners and Google to recognize Allerton. “What makes New York City so special is the diversity and uniqueness of its neighborhoods,” said United States Representative Joseph Crowley.

Jeremy Warneke, the district manager for the community board, recalled being asked by a reporter last year, “What is it like to live in Bronxdale?” He suggested that it was Allerton she wanted. It was. “I get called enough that it’s annoying for me,” he said. “So you rectify the map, you rectify the problem.”

City planners said they were updating community maps with the Allerton name. Allerton also appears now on Google Maps; it was added in February after users requested the change on the website and Mr. Crowley and other officials sent a letter urging Google to accept the change.

Fares Albrashi, a manager of a cellphone store, said that he had his own name for his neighborhood — A-town — and that Bronxdale and Bronxwood did not have the same ring. Laconia “sounds like some foreign cowboy trying to be American,” he added.

“This happens to be A-town,” he said. “I’ve been here my whole life so I want it to have the right name.”